page 4- The Behrend College Collegian. Thursday, April 23, 1998
The Behrend College Collegian
published weekly by the students of Penn State Erie, The Behrend College
Layout Editor
Nathan Mitchell
Photography Editor
Jason Blake
Business Manager
Dana Greenhouse
Features Editor
Jon Stubbs
News Editor
Ik Chan Kan #
Postal Information: The Collegian
is published weekly by the students
of Penn State Erie, The Behrend
College; First Floor. The J. Elmer
Reed Union Building, Station Road,
Erie, PA 16563. The Collegian can
be reached by calling (814) 898-6488
or (814) 898-6019 (FAX). ISSN
1071-9288.
Greeks handle SGA
elections poorly
The fraternities and sororities made
a great effort to assure that the Greek
Student Government Association
Senate candidates were elected into
office. While voting was taking place
outside of Bruno’s, members of so
rorities and fraternities were handing
out lists to voters stating all eleven
Greek candidates. They even made a
request to hang the list of the Greek
candidates in the voting booth.
It is not the fact that the Greek or
ganizations want to get involved with
SGA that is troublesome; their in
volvement could be very beneficial to
the organization. It is the way they are
going about it that is not right.
By encouraging students to vote for
candidates based only on their frater
nity or sorority status, they are sepa
rating Greek students from students
involved in other organizations. This
is exactly the opposite of what Greeks
claim they want to do on this cam
pus. One sorority member running for
SGA stated she wanted to promote
cooperation among groups on cam
pus. If the majority of SGA senators
are Greek, how is this cooperation
going to occur? If the Greek organi
zations truly want to promote coop-
Making higher
education affordable
By Christopher J. Dodd=Special to
The Hartford Courant
This is a time of great anticipation
for America’s high school seniors.
Colleges and universities have sent
out letters of acceptance and rejection
for the Class of 2002. And young
people across the country are racing
home after school to check their mail
boxes. But these days, the letter that
many students are most anxiously
awaiting is not from the admissions
office; it’s from the financial aid of
fice.
Getting into college is hard enough,
but many families are now finding
that the most important numbers for
determining where a student will go
to college are not GPAs and SAT
scores; they’re the numbers in their
bank account.
More and more, families are find
ing themselves unable to keep up with
the rising cost of a college degree. In
the past 10 years, costs at four-year
public universities have increased at
more than triple the rate of inflation.
Two-year community college costs
have increased twice as fast as infla
tion. In that same time, tuition at the
average private four-year college has
doubled from $6,700 to $13,300, an
increase of more than twice the rate
of inflation.
In fact, when you factor in tuition,
room and board, and other expenses,
four years at one of the nation’s lead
ing colleges can easily cost more than
$ 120,000 today.
In 1980, when most of today’s high
school seniors were born, few people
could have imagined that a year of
college would cost as much as
$30,000. But today the unimaginable
has become reality. As a result, fami-
Editor in Chief
Andrea M Zaffmo
Managing Editor
Anne M Rajotte
Sports Editor
Dylan Stewart
Associate Editor
Brian Ashbaugh
Advertising Manager
RJ Frelin
Advisor
Robert Speel
Letter Policy: The Collegian
encourages letters to the editor.
Letters should include the address,
phone number, semester standing and
major of the writer. Writers can mail
their letters to behrcoll2@aol.com.
Letters must be received no later than
spm Tuesday for inclusion in that
week’s issue.
eration betwetn all of the groups on
campus, they would not attempt to
monopolize SGA.
Members of Greek organizations
would not disclose from where the list
originated. They also claimed that
they told voters that were given the
list that they should look at all of the
candidates’ statements before voting.
However, when we obtained a list
from a fraternity member, we were not
informed of the statements. Presiden
tial candidate Buck Goedicke, who
was running the table next to the
booth, even had a list, which a female
student leaving the booth handed to
him, though he claimed not to be the
person who had given it to her.
Even the voting process itself was
not handled professionally. A voter
had to give bfily his or her name; vot
ers did not have to show an ID card
or social security number. A system
like this could make it possible for a
person to vote more than once.
The Greek campaign to win all of
the Senate seats of SGA is not being
handled well. They are directly con
tradicting their own claims of group
cooperation. It seems that the only
groups that the Greeks are truly con
cerned about are themselves.
lies are going deeper into debt, work
ing more overtime, taking extra jobs
and doing whatever it takes to meet
these rising expenses.
Some say that parents have only
themselves to blame for not saving
enough money to meet college costs.
That’s an untrue and unfair criticism.
More and more parents are doing a
better job of planning ahead. In fact,
68 percent of parents below the age
of 30 are saving regularly for college.
Parents should not need a key to Fort
Knox to open the doors of college to
their kids. We must do all we can to
make college affordable to each and
every family.
In recent years, we’ve taken some
significant steps forward. Last year.
Congress approved President
Clinton’s plan to eventually make the
first $lO,OOO of college costs tax-de
ductible. We increased the maximum
annual Pell Grant awards from $2,700
per year to $3,000. We also estab
lished HOPE Scholarships, which
provide a $ 1,500 tax credit for the first
two years of college. In addition, we
approved a number of new tax
advantaged education savings pro
grams, including education IRAs and
penalty-free IRA withdrawals forcer
tain higher-education expenses.
These steps are making a positive
difference for many families strug
gling to educate their children. But we
must do more.
Earlier this month, the Senate La
bor Committee, on which I sit, ap
proved a number of steps to improve
the affordability of college. One that
I authored would require educational
institutions to make full and detailed
disclosure to families of the costs of
attending institutes of higher learning.
Advisor
Alan Parker
Do you ever stop to think of the other side?
When I decided I wanted to do
something at Behrend more than just
hang out and go to classes. The Col
legian immediately appealed to me.
I thought, “Hey, it’s only one class a
week.” Also, I thought it would be a
good experience, as I’m a Communi
cations major.
Although next year I’m transferring
to another school and switching my
major, I still feel my experience with
The Collegian was valuable. First se
mester, I tackled a beat of “Health and
Safety," which I particularly enjoyed,
because I thought several pieces
would be beneficial to students here.
I truly hope I accomplished that. Sec
ond semester, I was given the chance
to write an editorial column every
three weeks, and decided to give it a
go-
Drug war is a lost cause - like prohibition
By Mike Gray
Special to the Los Angeles Times
Sixteen-year-old Jonathan
Kollman had been clean for several
months - a struggle, but he was hang
ing in there. Then he ran into this babe
in a red sports car who offered to buy
him a fix. For a fragile teenager hold
ing on by his fingernails, it was one
temptation too many. He made the
buy and 10 minutes later, he was back
in the jaws of the dragon with heroin
in his veins.
But what of the Dragon Lady ? Who
was this evil temptress? Turns out she
was a cop - an undercover narcotics
officer from the Plano, Texas, police
department who needed an informant.
Playing on the kid’s vulnerability, she
reintroduced him to his habit, and
once he was rehooked, she was able
to use him for a half dozen drug buys.
' If you believe the end justifies the
means, this little operation would
have to be considered a resounding
success - three dozen people busted
for selling or holding heroin, includ
ing Kollman. But a lot of the folks in
Plano are uneasy about this business
of using kids as offensive weapons
in the drug war. The boy’s parents,
for example - having just waged a ti
tanic battle to free their son from ad-
It would show parents the costs of
everything from faculty salaries and
pensions to groundskeeping, food,
even heating the dorms.
It is simply unfair that colleges and
universities ask parents and students
to make such a tremendous financial
sacrifice, yet they have no obligation
to tell them what these payments are
going toward or why they seem to
increase every year far faster than the
general rate of inflation.
My amendment will not only re
quire full disclosure of costs, but will
also give the secretary of education
the authority to fine institutions that
fail to comply, and even to suspend
federal support in the most extreme
cases for failing to come clean with
full disclosure. Ultimately, my hope
is that this amendment will give par
ents and students new knowledge
about how much money colleges and
universities charge, and why. And
with that knowledge, families will be
better able to shop around for the best
educational deals, and put some
much-needed pressure on institutions
of higher learning to keep costs down.
With this amendment, we are put
ting colleges and universities on no
tice. Parents, students and policy
makers are watching them, and are de
termined to keep education afford
able. As we move toward a more in
formation-based economy, higher
education is more important than ever,
and we must ensure that the doors of
college remain open to every Ameri
can.
Democrat Dodd represents Con
necticut in the U.S. Senate.
Editorial
Now I had this column, but needed
a name. “The Other Side” quickly
came to mind for many reasons! In
my opinions and personal beliefs, I
often feel like I’m in the minority. I
have very strong viewpoints and those
of you who read my articles probably
realize that! “The Other Side” gave
the column the “us vs. them” feel I
wanted.
I was thinking about differences we
all have with others and came to the
conclusion that ninety percent of our
problems could be resolved or drasti
cally lessened if people would focus
less on “winning” an argument and
more on where the other side’s com
ing from. Nowhere is this more ob
vious than the all too familiar conflicts
many of us had with our parents grow
ing up over the car or that early cur-
diction - are understandably dis
mayed that it was the police who
turned him on again.
But for all their trauma, Jonathan
Kollman’s parents are lucky. Chad
MacDonald Jr.’s mother probably
would trade places with them in a
second. When her son’s badly dam
aged young frame was found in an
alley south of downtown Los Ange
les last month, it was revealed that
he, too, had been lured into the ser
vice of the law. Earlier in the year,
the Brea Police Department in Or
ange County had captured
MacDonald with a half ounce of
methamphetamine, and they appar
ently saw in him the makings of a
useful snitch.
After MacDonald’s arrest in Janu
ary 1998 on charges of possession of
methamphetamine, the police offered
Chad and his mother a deal, and the
pressure must have been intense be
cause they went for it in spite of the
obvious danger. Rather than treat his
addiction, the deal dropped this high
school student unprepared into the
boiling pot of cutthroats who popu
late the illegal drug trade. Since these
guys are often facing 10 or 20 years
if they’re caught, they disdain infor
mants - a fact they underscored by
i V> <iS>***^
few. The parent’s concern is never
under account, really, and that should
be expected.
Life is a power struggle. The focus
for the large part is immediacy. Ev
eryone wants to feel good now. Ev
eryone wants to have fun now. Even
as I wrote about the University Park
professor leading pro-marijuana pro
tests, it was obvious he was thinking
in the now. He didn’t stop to con
sider the consequences of his actions.
He didn’t stop to think of the other
side to his actions. The same can be
said of Michael Zampetti’s crying
about student involvement and all the
health issues my articles first semes
ter dealt with.
I feel I accomplished my goals this
year in The Collegian. I found a great
forum to present my viewpoint and
torturing the kid before killing him
and then raping and shooting his girl
friend and leaving her for dead in the
San Gabriel Mountains.
Undoubtedly this is an arrangement
that everybody involved wishes they
had to do over again, but the truth is,
we’re likely to see more of this kind
of thing in the future, not less. Con
sider the problem from the cops’
viewpoint. You have a bunch of high
school kids dealing drugs to one an
other in private. How do you break
into this closed circle? That’s the in
tractable nexus of the war on drugs,
the thing that has driven our ongoing
assault on the Bill of Rights for more
than 80 years. In a drug deal, there’s
no complaining witness.
Most other criminals - the rapist,
the robber, the ax murderer - have
somebody chasing them or have vic
tims or survivors demanding justice.
But when there’s nobody to call the
cops, the cops have little choice. To
break up what is essentially a private
transaction, they inevitably have to
resort to some subterfuge that will
trample the Constitution, whether it’s
turning your kid into a junkie or splin
tering your front door without both
ering to knock or forcing you to the
pavement because you happen to be
had a good time doing so. Currently,
The Collegian is looking for writers,
photographers and editors. It would
be a great opportunity for anyone, but
especially Communications or En
glish students. Now that my shame
less plug is out of the way, I’ll use the
rest of my column to serve my own
interests. My first year of school here
at Behrend has been very enjoyable.
I love it here; there’s a good faculty,
an overall decent student body and a
beautiful campus. As I leave, I just
want to say thank you to everyone at
Penn State who helped me through the
course of the year here. To all stay
ing at Behrend: Good luck, have fun,
but stop to think about the other side.
The Other Side appeared every
three weeks in The Collegian.
a black man in an expensive car.
It is the nature of the drug war it
self that creates this ethical quagmire,
not the perversity of the police. Brea
Police Chief William Lentini was
simply trying his best to carry out the
impossible task we’ve handed him.
Our hands are hardly clean on this
issue. The latest polls show that 70
percent of the American people think
the drug war is a failure - and that we
should keep at it. As President Clinton
has pointed out, doing the same thing
over and over and expecting a differ
ent result is the definition of insan
ity.
Like a man who has set his hair on
fire and is trying to put it out with a
hammer, we will continue to pulver
ize our principles and devour our
young until the drug war’s violence
and corruption finally reaches every
nook and cranny of our lives. Only
then will we face the fact, as we did
with alcohol prohibition in 1933, that
the problem is not what’s in the bottle,
but how we’ve chosen to deal with
Gray 's latest book, "Drug Crazy:
How We Got Into This Mess and How
We Can Get Out, " will be published
by Random House in June.